Sex, Marriage, and Family in World Religions

by Don S. Browning, M. Christian Green, John Witte Jr.

Spanning thousands of years, this new collection brings together writings and teachings about sex, marriage, and family from the Jewish, Christian, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, and Confucian traditions. The volume includes traditional texts as well as contemporary materials showing how the religions have responded to the changing conditions and mores of modern life. It reveals the similarities and differences among the various religions and the development of ideas and teachings within each tradition. Selections shed light on each religion's views on a range of subjects, including sexuality and sexual pleasure, the meaning and purpose of marriage, the role of betrothal, the status of women, the place of romance, grounds for divorce, celibacy, and sexual deviance.

Separate chapters devoted to each religion include introductions by leading scholars that contextualize the readings. The selections are drawn from a variety of genres including ritual, legal, theological, poetic, and mythic texts. The volume contains such diverse examples as the Zohar on conjugal manners, a contemporary Episcopalian liturgy for same-sex unions, Qur'anic passages on the equality of the sexes, the Ka–masu–tra on husbands, wives, and lovers, Buddhist writings on celibacy, and Confucian teachings on filial piety.

Contributors Michael S. Berger, Emory University; Azizah Y. al-Hibri, Richmond School of Law; Alan Cole, Lewis and Clark College; Paul B. Courtright, Emory University; Patricia Buckley Ebrey, University of Washington; Raja M. El-Habti, Muslim Women Lawyers for Human Rights; Luke Timothy Johnson, Emory University; Mark D. Jordan, Emory University

461 pages, Hardcover

First published January 3, 2006

About the author

Don S. Browning was the Alexander Campbell Professor Emeritus of Ethics and the Social Sciences at the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. Trained in theology, he was equally conversant in modern psychology, philosophy, ethics, sociology, and in the last decade of his life, family law. Browning brought Ivory Tower theological theory to earth by bridging the study of religion with fields including psychology and law, and issues such as marriage and family.

One of the architects of Practical Theology, which looks into ways to link theology to law, psychology and pastoral care. The ideas were laid out in one of his most widely known books, "A Fundamental Practical Theology," published in 1991.

In his early work, he sought to bridge theology and psychology in the service of pastoral care around such diverse themes as the atonement, generativity, poverty, personality theory, and the quest for a normative anthropology. Browning is constant in his challenge that religious leaders need to be capable of moral deliberation in the midst of the complex emotional and social dynamics of daily living. His critical observation about pastoral counseling in a parish or congregational setting remains relevant.